This study provides a comprehensive assessment of falls over 3 years, highlighting differences in fall patterns and associated self-reported risk factors between men and women. These findings may offer valuable insights for developing sex-specific fall risk prediction models and targeted fall prevention strategies.
Our results suggest that FRID use is associated with increased prospective incidence rates of total, injurious, and recurrent falls even among generally healthy older adults.
Our findings suggest that decreased VA is an independent predictor of an about 20% increased risk of all and injurious falls, highlighting the importance of regular eye examinations and VA measurements for fall prevention, even in generally healthy and active older adults.
Baseline number of prevalent chronic diseases and multimorbidity in generally healthy and active community-dwelling older adults were associated with increased incidence rates of all and injurious falls over 3 years. These findings support that multimorbidity may need consideration as a risk factor for falls, even in generally healthy and active older adults.
ID is associated with increased hospitalization rate and not associated with LOS ≥5 days among generally healthy older adults. Efforts to minimize ID in older adults may improve overall health and optimize healthcare costs.
Based on this prospective study among generally healthy European community-dwelling older adults, iron deficiency was not associated with the incidence rate of overall infections but may increase the incidence of severe infections. Intervention studies are needed to prove the causality of this observation.
Among generally healthy, active, and vitamin D-replete older adults, omega-3 supplementation may have a modest benefit on the incidence of total falls, whilst a daily high dose of vitamin D or a SHEP had no benefit.
DO-HEALTH was registered under the protocol NCT01745263 at the International Trials Registry ( clinicaltrials.gov ), and under the protocol number 2012-001249-41 at the Registration at the European Community Clinical Trial System (EudraCT).
These findings suggest that iron deficiency may play a role in low-grade chronic inflammation among relatively healthy older adults.